A known parking assist device disclosed in JP 2000-168475A includes four CCD cameras (C1, C2, C3 and C4), and each of which is attached to each of four corner portions of the vehicle as shown in FIG. 8. Specifically, the CCD camera C1 captures an image P1, the CCD camera C2 captures an image P2, the CCD camera C3 captures an image P3, and CCD camera C4 captures an image P4. These images are arrayed and displayed on a displaying means of a car navigation device, which is provided near a front installment panel of the vehicle, without any modification. Thus, an area that is out of driver's line of vision can be captured by each of the cameras, and these captured images are displayed so as to be seen in the vehicle in order to supplement the user's view.
Further, a known vehicle surrounding monitoring system is disclosed in JP2002-019556A. FIG. 9 illustrates a schematic view indicating positions of cameras C of a vehicle, and FIG. 10 illustrates a schematic view of a display on a displaying means (not shown). This vehicle surrounding monitoring system includes the plural cameras C, and each of which is attached at a predetermined position of each of the front, rear, left and right of the vehicle. Ranges to be captured by the cameras C are indicated by chain lines in FIG. 9. Images captured by the cameras C are arrayed and displayed on the displaying means as shown in FIG. 10.
Furthermore, another vehicle surrounding monitoring system disclosed in JP3300334C includes plural cameras C and a virtual viewpoint KS as shown in FIG. 11. FIG. 11 explains a relationship between the cameras C and the virtual viewpoint KS. Each camera C is provided at a predetermined position of the vehicle, and a virtual viewpoint KS is set as shown in FIG. 11 in order to create a combined image, in which images captured by the cameras C are combined. On the basis of the combined image, a vehicle surrounding is monitored the surrounding of the vehicle.
However, the parking assist system disclosed in JP2000-168475 cannot display the object seamlessly when each of capturing ranges (C1, C2, C3 and C4) is not overlapped together.
Further, when the monitoring system disclosed in JP2002-019556A displays the images, within the overlapped ranges (hatched area in FIG. 9) which are overlapped together, and as shown in FIG. 10, each of the images are displayed on the displaying device, for example, if the image captured by the front camera and the image captured by the side camera are displayed on the monitoring device, the object existing within the overlapped range of the capturing images is displayed in each of the captured image. Thus, two objects are displayed in the displayed image, as a result, the user may misunderstand that there are two objects in the surrounding of the vehicle, or it becomes difficult for the user to recognize a positional relationship between the vehicle and the object.
Furthermore, the monitoring system disclosed in JP3300334C inputs plural images captured by the plural cameras C, and viewpoints of these images are converted into the virtual viewpoint KS, which is set at a position from which the vehicle is seen from the top thereof. In such case, when the viewpoint of each camera is converted on the basis of a road surface, because a capturing direction of the camera is also be changed, a solid object cannot be captured or captured redundantly, at the same time, because each camera captures the solid object on its different surfaces, the captured images cannot be combined smoothly.